Table tennis star Samsonov announced his withdrawal from the Tokyo Olympic Games, which attracted the attention of the International Table Tennis Federation. Of course, before Lao Sa, whether it was a men's singles women's singles or a women's team, there were players or teams who chose not to participate or withdraw from the competition, and some of them withdrew from singles and only participated in mixed doubles.
Born in 1976, Samsonov can be described as an evergreen tree in table tennis, and is known as the "Three Tigers of Europe" along with Waldner and Primoratc. He has played in table tennis for more than 20 years, played several generations of Chinese players, and has been praised by Chinese fans as the "head of the Taiji Sect" and affectionately known as "Lao Sa".
Samsonov has been competing in six consecutive Olympic Games since 1996. In the quarter-finals of the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games, Samsonov led 2-0, suffered two stadium power outages, and was reversed by the Chinese team Wang Tao 2-3; at the 2016 Rio Olympics, Samsonov defeated Ocharov to reach the final four, but lost to Zhang Jike and Mizutani Falcon and missed the medal.
At the Tokyo Olympic Games, Samsonov qualified for the competition with the world ranking, and at the beginning the Belarusian team had confirmed Samsonov's participation, and finally chose to withdraw from the competition.
Samsonov is the fourth male athlete not to compete or withdraw from the competition. Among the men's singles players who retired or did not participate, Wang Zhen of the Canadian team did not participate in the men's singles, and Wang Zhen and Zhang Mo will participate in the mixed doubles.
In the women's singles, there are also 5 players who have obtained the qualification and finally confirmed that they will not participate. In the women's team, the North Korean team withdrew.